Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Mixology Monday Roundup: Drink Your Vegetables

It’s Mixology Monday wrap-up time! As your host, I’m truly having an amazing time with MxMo LXXII: Drink Your Vegetables, reading about all the exciting drinks and imaginative ways of combining booze with veggies. The turnout for this event shows the diversity of cocktail enthusiasts, and I’m very pleased to see some regulars, as well as some first timers who found inspiration in this theme.

First up is JFL of Rated R Cocktails, who answers that crunchy question, “What’s up, doc?” with Bugs Bunny, a rye-based carrot number to appeal to even the sharpest rabbit.

If it didn’t already feel like a vegetable patch around here, Raffaele Bellomi of The Shorter Straw brings us a trifecta of vegetal delights. The Green Wiseman (pictured) is fueled with gin and rocket. (That’s arugula here in the States.) Il Sangue di Maria is an unusual cachaça-tequila combo with celery and cherry tomato. Bitter Cup is a striking Pimm’s with fresh citrus, the traditional cucumber, and a big burst of Angostura Bitters.

Next we have a pair of Martinis by DJ HawaiianShirt of Spirited Remix. The Martini au Chef de Cuisine has a lacing of red onion than might just conjure my Gibson-loving great aunt from the great beyond. The companion piece, the Martini au Jardinier, is an herbal number. Parsley seems a quasi-vegetable, eaten as such in tabbouleh and pancake restaurants.

If the Fogged In Lounge seems a little low and salty from time to time, our honored visitor Matt L. Miller helps us out with the Low Country Celery, a dirty genever Martini with a little celery action and a spicy green bean.

As a scotch fan, I’m intrigued by Moscrop by Mark Holmes of Cardiff Cocktails. An unusual blend of peaty malt, sweet romano pepper juice and chili-infused vermouth, it looks a tasty thing of smoke and bite.

The incomparable Fred Yarm of Cocktail Virgin Slut and our fearless MxMo leader whips up a handsome Going Back to Mezcali by Donato Alvarez: smoky, herbal, sweet and of course vegetal. I’m intrigued by the way it looks like red like Aperol and tastes of cucumber. And is the rhubarb in Aperol a vegetable? Looks like chard stems but we eat it like a fruit. Sort of like the cucumber being a fruit but we eat it like avegetable. OK—enough of that or my head’s gonna explode.

Booze Nerds’ Christa and Shaun bring us a pair of cocktails featuring offbeat vodka infusions: celery root in The Night Market (which has sweet potato shochu as well), and watercress in The Hippy Chick. I’ve shown the HC here cuz I can’t resist a green drink.

More crazy infusions! Steve and Paul of Cocktail Buzz infuse moonshine with parsnip and soju with carrot as shown to rooty effect in their Logan 5.

I think if I had a Lazy Sunday Punch, a blended tequila drink from Elana of Stir and Strain, I might never getout of my chair. Floral notes, grapefruit and a cucumber spear seem to add up to a refreshing afternoon of idleness.

Andrea of Gin Houndlays down some of the hippest beets ever. There’s the fascinating, Fernet-driven Ode to Bax Beet Pinot, and then she goes and makes her own beet beer on which she bases the Beet Beet Cooler. How cool is that?!

I would like to thank everyone who participated for all their awesome drinks, articles and effort. I’d like to thank Mixology Monday moderator Frederic Yarm who makes it all happen. And thank all you readers out there for dropping by to see us do this incredibly fun monthly cocktail writers’ event. Cheers!